RTM Consulting

Support Services typically employs about 8% of company employees and is increasingly responsible for platform-based customer retention and earning the right to expand the relationship by delivering a superior customer experience.

However, a huge challenge we’re seeing for tech companies today is the need to support ever-increasingly complex products in a broader ecosystem and having the right amount of support engineers, with the right skills, at the right time.

So the question is, what can we do to overcome that challenge and set support up for success to ensure they’re able to deliver the experience customers expect? Watch this webinar to find out!

During this webcast, Randy Mysliviec, President and CEO of RTM Consulting and Vele Galovski, TSIA’s VP, Support and Field Services  discuss:

• Effective methodologies for resourcing support center(s) in a way that optimizes both cost and customer experience
• Workforce planning processes to accurately forecast the skill sets required to deliver on future service revenues
• Insights on how to optimize customer service and staff utilization through effective forecasting, scheduling, and staff management practices

RTM Consulting Managing Partner, Marc Lacroix, speaks on a recent Resource Management Institute webcast on how digital transformation is shifting the thinking of business users from what is essential to what is possible with technology. During the session he reviews what RMOs are doing with their automation, and what are some of the capabilities required to make RMOs more strategic to the organizations they support.

The session continues with a panel of leading services automation vendors discussing what the future holds for resource management automation and how this will enable RMOs to provide greater strategic value to their stakeholders. Panelists include Jody Koch, Senior Implementation Consultant, KeyedIn Solutions, Mark Robinson, Co-Founder, Kimble Applications, Jared Haleck, SVP of Product, Mavenlink, and Rafat Hilal, Director of Product Strategy, Upland Software.

PS Digital is our holistic approach to helping professional and consulting services organizations keep pace with a rapidly changing technology landscape. The fast pace of innovation within the industry combined with broader technology trends present services organizations with more compelling, cost effective solutions that makes the status quo and incremental approaches no longer acceptable.

When people think of automating PS, many think of just the PSA component. However, true digital transformation and automation is more broad than that. It requires integration with surrounding systems such as CRM, ERP, Expense Management, HCM, etc. When integrating these systems many challenges arise and not all of these challenges are technical in nature. This 30 minute webcast provides some key learnings and insights into how to successfully integrate your PSA.

Digital Transformation is the latest buzz word taking the world by storm. The pace of technological change is accelerating and how people use technology in their everyday lives is fundamentally changing how businesses have to operate to meet customer and marketplace demands. Simply automating a manual process is not enough. PS Digital is our holistic approach to helping professional and consulting services organizations keep pace with a rapidly changing technology landscape. The fast pace of innovation within the industry combined with broader technology trends present services organizations with more compelling, cost effective solutions that makes the status quo and incremental approaches no longer acceptable.

Many Professional Services functional areas are interconnected – e.g. Resource Management, Project Management, Revenue Forecasting, Capacity Planning, etc. A change in one area can have impacts on all the other areas, impacting not only consultants, but many stakeholders throughout the organization. During this webinar we talk about this interconnectedness and how to navigate and manage in that environment.

RTM Consulting Technology Practice Leader, Wade Little, presents our first webcast in a 3-part webinar series on PS Digital. In this first webcast, The Opportunity of Digital Transformation for Professional Services Organizations, we highlight the forces that are driving Digital Transformation for PSOs and how PS Digital can help, from start to finish, on your Digital Transformation journey. We also identify some of the key components and technology areas that need to be considered specific to professional and consulting services.

The most effective Professional Services Organizations recognize that skills development cannot be done in the margins and view training as a strategic initiative that requires thoughtful planning vs. a one-time event. They foster a culture of continuous learning and align learning and development with the role and career progression goals of their employees.

Last year RTM Consulting launched PS University, an innovative approach to address the ongoing learning and development needs of PSOs through role-specific learning paths and curriculum, supported by highly flexible training delivery options and subscription pricing for larger enterprises.

During this 30-minute webcast RTM Consulting Training Practice Leader, Ryan Childers, discusses this unique approach to professional services skills development and the essential steps you should take to get started on a programmatic approach to developing the professional services training your employees need to be successful.

Is technology failing to deliver the promised outcomes? How much of it is down to the people and processes? Drawing on their experience of driving change initiatives at hundreds of organizations, this webinar brings together a panel of experts – Kimble CMO Mark Robinson, RTM Consulting Managing Partner Marc Lacroix, and former Tribal Group CEO Rob Garner – to share practical advice on how to enable an entire organization to commit to a well-defined vision for how the business will operate.

During this webcast the panel discusses how to organize for success, designing target operating models to support desired outcomes, how to focus on commonalities, and fully investing in adoption. This webinar is designed to provide a clear understanding of how to deliver successful technology adoption within your organization.

Of all the roles within a professional and consulting services organization, the role of project manager is the most misused, misunderstood and undervalued of all the delivery roles. In addition, project managers are facing changing delivery dynamics brought on by the rise of SaaS solutions and virtualization and globalization of project teams. Ask yourself… are your project managers in step with your delivery strategy?

During this webinar RTM Consulting Managing Partner, Marc Lacroix, highlights the forces that are impacting the role of project managers today and some of the missteps delivery organizations are making with the role and function. The webcast also focuses on solutions and how redefining the project manager role in your organization requires changes in the way you position project management, the way you are organized, and the systems that support the function. Joining RTM Consulting is David Young, Director of Professional Services Research & Advisory at TSIA, to share his insights on the role of project manager.

On-demand webcast entitles you to obtain 1 RMCP® PCU credit for watching.

For Professional and Consulting Services organizations, Professional Services Automation (PSA) is the industry standard, but this has not always been the case. Historically, organizations have implemented a wide range of solutions to meet their needs, including some of the early PSA pioneers or amalgamated uses of enterprise applications like ERP. In the last few years, however, due to the disruptions of cloud, mobility and data-centric management, there have been seismic shifts in PS automation and PSA enablement. Service organizations are investing in improving automation and PSA adoption is growing. We are calling this trend PSA 2.0, the next wave of PS automation.

This webcast provides insights into what is driving the needs of services organizations today and how the PSA market is innovating to meet these demands. Joining RTM Consulting during this webcast is John Ragsdale, Vice President of Technology and Social Research for Technology Services Industry Association (TSIA).

On-demand webcast entitles you to obtain 1 RMCP® PCU credit  for watching.

Whether you are a new or well established services firm, you face the same fundamental challenge of how to scale your organization to the next level. CRM, professional services automation (PSA) and accounting systems can help, providing greater visibility of operational data on which to base your decision making. But to progress on your growth journey, you have to find ways to empower more of your team to make decisions and provide a framework to ensure that these decisions are consistently correct.

Pulled from our experience of implementing automation for numerous services organizations and consulting companies, this presentation provides real-world examples of what provides value and what does not. Industry experts from RTM Consulting and Kimble explain how a process-centric and outcome-orientated approach rapidly delivers higher profitability and scalability for your services organization.

On-demand webcast entitles you to obtain 1 RMCP® PCU credit  for watching.

The Variability Reduction technique provides an agile solution that gets you fact based data fast to focus on where real and rapid cost reduction opportunities can be found, while also identifying and enabling customer service improvement opportunities. Here is an example of a recent situation:

• Variability Reduction was used with a $5B+ hardware/software firm…
• It helped them achieve parts cost savings exceeding $1.5M/month, while overall improving customer service…
• Making this transformation effort even more interesting was the time from problem identification to real savings was less than six months…
• And the savings were/are expected to continue on in future years!

Watch this 30 minute webcast to learn how sophisticated service delivery teams have figured out how to reduce costs by using Variability Reduction as a proven method to get results fast. Joining RTM Consulting is Pitney Bowes providing a case study perspective of their experiences utilizing Variability Reduction.

In our conversations with field services executives, it’s clear that there is a renewed focus on the customer experience and these organizations are well aware of the importance of getting the customer experience right.

The question now becomes how many organizations are actively taking the steps necessary to improve and deliver a superior customer experience that will differentiate them from the competition. Building a more tightly integrated approach to engineering the customer experience is not easy but can be done. It requires rethinking how we approach service delivery design and execution, what we measure, and how we ultimately achieve better customer outcomes.

Every delivery leader would agree that consistent, standard, repeatable delivery execution is a goal of every organization. For Professional Services Organizations (PSOs) of any reasonable size, a Project Management Office (PMO) is essential to achieving this goal. Too often, however, organizations do not have one, have abandoned them or have not adequately structured and funded them to be effective. This is a missed opportunity to bring more value to your organization through more consistent project performance and execution. The fact is there is a strong correlation between the existence of a PMO and project success, however, not all PMOs are the same. Each organization is different, and PMOs can be structured to meet the unique needs of each organization.

This webcast will help you make the case for having a PMO, and then provide guidance on how to get started on your path to an impactful PMO. Joining RTM Consulting during this webcast will be Bo Di Muccio, VP Research, Professional Services at Technology Services Industry Association.

On-demand webcast session entitles you to obtain 1 RMCP® PCU credit for watching.

Every person in service delivery should ask themselves – and all involved at the inception of a project – What is the definition of success for this project? It seems simple, but it’s infrequently done. We offer a simple definition of success that can apply to all projects – A Successful project is when the team delivered what was required and in-line with expectations. The definition is light on specifics but very clear.

The traditional definitions of project success tend to be what people can measure: on-budget, on-time, customer’s satisfaction. These KPIs are a single, measurable criteria for success. Back to the simple definition, success is about meeting everyone’s expectations. This introduces a broader set of success criteria: easier to use, lowered admin time, access to reporting data. These criteria are driven more by stakeholder’s expectations of the project and it is these expectations that are influencing their views of success.

On-demand webcast session entitles you to obtain 1 RMCP® PCU credit for watching.

Quickly Capture Parts Cost Savings by Managing Variability.

One of the processes that is 100% in control of Field Services Management is parts variability. Variability management is something most service organizations understand, but very few effectively manage well and are therefore leaving big cost savings on the table. Effectively managing parts usage variability at discrete levels (individual, team, geography, on-site versus off-site, customer segment, product platform, etc.) can routinely lead to capturing 5 – 10% in parts cost savings. This webcast shows how some companies are making more effective variability management a cornerstone of their business model transformation as a part of optimizing their current cost structure to meet current financial commitments, as well as to provide the investment dollars needed to transition to an outcome based service model.

During the webcast, Pitney Bowes, brings a case study perspective of how they were able to significantly lower their parts cost through effective variability management.

Also, joining RTM Consulting during this webcast is Vele Galovski, VP Research, Field Services at TSIA, with perspective on how TSIA builds variability assessments into their Field Service Benchmarks to help significantly improve your Field Services results. After watching this webinar, you will leave with very specific actions and practical tips that you and your team can take to optimize your cost structure.

What is ‘After the Shift’?

Field and Support organizations are challenged today to replace traditional service offerings, where technical services are provided for a fixed price, to new models where technical services revenues are earned by delivering positive customer outcomes. The most challenging problem is a short-term financial one. As the operating models transition, the service organization finds itself unable to deliver short-term financial commitments and generate the investment dollars needed to enable a successful operating model transformation. This webinar provides specific actions services leadership need to take now to ensure they can shift from a traditional service supplier to a differentiated and highly competitive supplier delivering improved customer outcomes.

Watch this webinar and learn how to:

• Effectively improve results to deliver current year commitments and provide investments required for business model transformation
• Successfully migrate to a B4B business model
• Strategically develop and gain alignment within your company to enable a successful transition
• Survive, professionally and personally, by avoiding common failure modes

Ultimately, successful B4B companies will deliver superior financial performance (for themselves and their customers), an improved customer experience with their solution, and a significantly more engaged employee workforce.

Recent research makes it clear that while the professional and consulting services industry has invested in process improvements to enhance project performance, quality and cost delivery, the industry is actually getting worse at Resource Management (RM)! Given that labor cost in services is your biggest cost element, these trends must be reversed for any professional or consulting services organization to be successful. In this webinar, we discuss five key industry barriers to success and how to overcome them to achieve true Just-in-Time Resourcing^® – enabling your team to predictably get the Right Person in the Right Place at the Right Time.

Learn how to become masters of Resource Management and achieve real Just-in-Time Resourcing®.

On-demand webcast session entitles you to obtain 1 RMCP® PCU credit for watching.

Shift to the Left is about moving high-cost services delivery channels to lower cost delivery channels… and do it in a way that improves the overall experience for your customers. It combines an innovative Strategic Framework and Transformation Process, as well as the effective use of remote solutions to shift services delivery from on-site to on-call and on-line. Remote solutions provide the ability to use people, process and technology to enable flexibility and provide services regardless of your customer’s location.

Watch this webinar and learn how to:

• Achieve discontinuous improvements in financial performance, customer experience and employee productivity by using remote solutions to optimize service delivery channels
• Use Strategic Frameworks and Transformation Processes to effectively execute rapid and needed change in your service delivery operations
• Make remote solutions a company-wide, and not a service only, initiative
• Quantify the benefits from remote solutions to justify investments required to optimize your delivery channels
• Avoid the common failure modes in implementing remote solutions

Not only are projects becoming increasingly complex, but organizations are facing an even greater challenge of delivering more project value while ensuring demanding customers are satisfied with the solution. Project Management is a knowledge intensive discipline which requires skilled professionals to manage and deliver projects on-time, on-budget and with exceptional quality on a consistent basis. To address these growing challenges, organizations have focused on creating Project Management Offices (PMOs) supported by process automation technology.

What most organizations often forget is the key component of every project – people. And people, empowered with knowledge, leads to project success. People with access to knowledge management capabilities benefit the organization by:

• Leveraging existing knowledge capital accelerating successful project completions
• Avoiding project pitfalls learned from past similar implementations
• Locating necessary resources more quickly
• Sharing organizational learnings for future benefit of the organization and clients

RTM Consulting presents, Benefits of a Knowledge Management Powered Project Management Office. During this webcast you will learn how a comprehensive KM practice helps Project Managers streamline and improve usable knowledge capital, enable knowledge sharing and leverage knowledge capital to provide a competitive advantage in the marketplace.

On-demand webcast entitles you to obtain 1 RMCP® PCU credit  for watching.

Making the transition from supporting premise based solutions to cloud based solutions has become a struggle for some technology services organizations. Though services organization often struggle with the transition, successful PSO leaders are readily embracing the opportunities associated with this model for their organizations including:

• Staffing skilled resources across multiple client implementations
• Managing virtual, global staffing more effectively
• Blurring the lines of implementation and support to minimize post production quality issues

But PSO leaders need to be mindful of the new management and operational challenges this model can present. This webcast combines deep operational experience and proven best practices from RTM Consulting with industry leading research from TSIA. Join Randy Mysliviec, CEO, RTM Consulting and Bo DiMuccio, VP of Professional Services, TSIA for this session and learn about key practices that lead to achieving better results while avoiding the many pitfalls experienced by professional services teams around the globe.